32w+2 (yup you read that right!)- Reasons To Be Cheerful.

Well after 28 weeks my next target was 32 weeks and here we all are, me, 2 very kicky twins and Chris. We had a scan today and the babies are still looking quite chunky at 4lb 13oz and 4lb 6oz. They are both now poised head down which I'm hoping will make for a quick and easy exit, but not so quick that it happens in the middle of the Tyne Bridge! We also got 2 important dates today, one for the removal of the cervical stitch, which may start labour, and a second for an elective Caesarian section when I am term for identical twins, which I don't see happening but I guess is always a possibility! I'm going to maintain the element of surprise and keep quiet on the exact dates but hopefully our twins will have arrived safe and well within the next month! I am still very nervous and I won't relax until they are here in our arms but the end feels like it's in sight at least.

It was really lovely that in clinic today so many staff took time out to say how pleased they were that we had got this far. It really made me feel well looked after. The sonographer said that I felt like she had been scanning me for ages! I replied that I feel that I have been pregnant for ages! I worked out that of the past 17 months, I have been pregnant for about 13 of them! Pub quiz fact: That is approximately the same amount of time that a camel is pregnant for,but not quite as long as a giraffe!

I have been so impressed by all the care we have received both in this pregnancy and when Matthew and Oliver were born. In my last post I talked about bad luck. In this post I wanted to turn the tables a little and talk a bit about other things that I am extreemly grateful for:

I am so happy that we got to spend almost a week with Oliver and Matthew. I have friends whose babies were still born and I am so glad that we got even a tiny bit of time to get to know our sons.

I'm really glad that all four of Matthew and Oliver's grandparents got to meet them in their short lives.

I am so grateful that I have a wonderful family and fabulous friends who have been really supportive of me and Chris all along the whole journey..... and I'm so lucky to have a wonderful  husband who has looked after me tons this pregnancy (cooks me lovely food, drinks low alcohol beer so he can drive me to the hospital at any given point, gives words of encouragement to the bump etc, etc,) even though it's been tough for him too.

Team Broomhall in our finery!

I have met some really inspirational people through what has happened in the past year and although sometimes it feels like we are all members of "The club that no one wants to join" I have made some great friendships with other bereaved mums and become closer to others that I already knew.

I am relieved that I am lucky enough to live in a country with health care which is high quality and free. I spent some time years ago working in a school in Kenya which had a maternity clinic attached to it. I know that if my boys had been born out there then they wouldn't have had any hope of survival. I also know that in many places in the world I wouldn't be having the fortnightly scans and appointments that I have now and that I wouldn't be able to drive 15mins to the hospital to get checked out whenever I needed to. I dread to think the bills we would be racking up if we lived on the other side of the Atlantic

Me and some smiley happy faces when I was teaching in Kenya.

I'm really relieved that we didn't have to battle for years to get pregnant in the first place. To do that and then to lose a child or children, like several of my friends have, must be even more extra hard and difficult!
....And I'm sure that there is much more.

For those of you who are wondering. I have summoned up the courage to get the half made curtains that I started making on October the 7th last year out of the box but I haven't plucked up the courage to finish them yet.. still it's a start!